BLACKSBURG, Va. (March 2, 2013) – The ETSU men’s and women’s track and field teams put a wrap on another indoor season Saturday afternoon at the VT Final Qualifier inside Tech’s Rector Field House.

Eleven ETSU competitors were sent to the meet in an attempt to qualify for the NCAA Indoor Championships, but did not reach the qualifying marks in the their respective events.

ETSU’s closest qualifier entering Saturday’s meet was Ifrish Alberg (Paramaribo, Suriname) who posted a personal-best time of 6.68 at last weekend’s Atlantic Sun Indoor Championships to rank No. 20 in the NCAA. The 16th-place and qualifying time was 6.66, but Alberg ran a 6.75 in both the prelims and the finals on Saturday to come up shy.

Junior Tyler Stepp (Dandridge, Tenn.) came inches away from hitting the qualifying mark in the long jump. Stepp set a new personal best with a 7.61m leap, coming up just shy of the distance needed entering the day of 7.63m to rank among the nation’s top 16.

"We had some solid performances at the meet highlighted by Tyler Stepp's long jump and Jason Johnson's triple jump," Director of ETSU Track & Field/Cross Country George Watts said. "Tyler improved another four inches and misses out of qualifying for the NCAA Championships by just three inches. Jason continues to improve and I look forward to big things from him outdoors. His jump was a personal best and I believe he is very close to having a big jump in the very near future.

"Although Ifrish did not improve his time in the 60-meter dash, he came very close to qualifying for the NCAA missing out by .02. Tyler, Ifrish and Kelly Monteleone ranked in the top 50 in their events this indoor season.

"Our goal going forward is to improve on a daily basis. We have the talent on both teams to expect some NCAA qualifiers at the outdoor championships."